Media Lean Left, Say Journalists Who Don’t Really Say That

The end of a story in Politico (12/18/13), about a Politico media roundtable featuring CNN‘s Jake Tapper, NBC‘s Kelly O’Donnell, and Peter Baker and Mark Leibovich of the New York Times, caught my eye:

All four journalists were in agreement that the media in general leans left. Tapper said it’s simplistic to call out conservative or liberal, but it is a question of experiences and lifestyle. Most reporters and editors in New York or Washington have never worked a minimum wage job, experienced poverty or are Evangelical Christians, Tapper said.

Later on in the discussion, Tapper acknowledged that the “yes” answers would be “taken by Brent Bozell”– a reference to the conservative activist who runs the Media Research Center, which did in fact post a story about this, saying that “it’s progress to see prominent journalists admitting a slant in the newsroom.”

What intrigued me about this was that the one journalist who was quoted–CNN host Jake Tapper–didn’t seem to be giving evidence of a left-wing tilt in the press corps. If journalists are mostly people who come from relatively privileged backgrounds–which sounds plausible, when it comes to elite New York or D.C. reporters–then it’s hard to imagine why that would be considered leaning to the left.

Those affirmative responses about the media’s tilt came in response to a question from Politico‘s Mike Allen, who wanted each panelist to answer in one word whether they thought the media “leans left.”

One panelist, Mark Leibovich of the New York Times, said that he “rarely talk about politics with my colleagues,” but then explained: “None of my neighbors are evangelical Christians. I don’t know a lot of people in my kid’s pre-school who are pro-life.”

It’s not clear why the views of his neighbors much matter–or why he talks about politics with parents at a pre-school, but not with his journalistic colleagues, who are supposed to be experts on the stuff–but Leibovich goes on to say that in the rare occasion when politics does come up among journalists, there are “clues” that lead him to believe that “absolutely a leftward lean.”

Jake Tapper (cc photo: Victoria Pickering)

Tapper said that a “a certain type of person becomes a reporter” in Washington and New York–a person who has “never worked a minimum wage job outside of high school,” has “never experienced poverty” and “is not an evangelical Christian.”

But, Tapper says, good journalism can happen when reporters are “aware of the country that they’re writing for, the country they’re on TV for.” Then he also admits that “you don’t see a lot of coverage of poverty”–which is certainlytrue, and just as certainly not a sign that the media lean left. Tapper also says there is inadequate coverage of faith and “the troops.” I’m not sure how one could make the case that either really suffers from a lack of coverage.

Tapper adds that it’s “simplistic to say it’s liberal or conservative”–which is a fair point. So why agree the media lean left, then?

New York Times reporter Peter Baker weighed in to say that “they did do surveys, more reporters think of themselves as being liberal or Democratic than not”–which might be a reference to the surveys that found more reporters voted for Bill Clinton than Bob Dole, which tells you little about how they operate. Baker explains that he doesn’t vote–that’ll fix the problem!–but then said he thought the real problem is the “bias toward conflict” and “sensation,” and he expresses a wish that the media were generally be more substantive. Useful observations, to be sure, but none of which would point to a media tilting left.

And NBC‘s Norah O’Donnell, explained that she felt she “had to say yes” to the question about the liberal-leaning media because of MSNBC, the liberal-leaning cable channel. By that logic, the existence of Fox News Channel and the domination of talk radio by conservatives would suggest a far-right media bias.

O’Donnell went on to say that she tries to be fair, and that while she loves politics, she doesn’t “feel particularly swayed one way or another.” She admits that when she’s covering Republican politicians or conservative events she encounters people who are every critical of the media: “I’ve heard quite a lot of their criticism and I take it seriously.”

So what emerges is a sense that elite journalists are well-off, don’t live near many religious people but seem particularly attuned to criticism coming from the right–which is precisely the purpose of right-wing media criticism.

The striking thing about the responses is that they so little addressed what would seem to be the fundamental question: Does what is actually in the media suggest a liberal bias? Tapper’s comment about the dearth of poverty coverage is correct, and runs counter to the notion of rampant media liberalism.

So ask yourself: Did left critics of the Iraq War dominate the debate over the invasion? No. Do liberal or left guests outnumber the right on the Sunday chat shows? No. Well, what about on PBS? No. NPR? No. Have left critics of US foreign policy ever suffered from media overexposure? No.

So what kind of liberalism are these reporters talking about? It seems that they’re admitting that they live in an elite, culturally secular milieu that is unrepresentative of American life. Fair enough. Right-wing media critics have been saying that for years, and obviously this has had some effect.

But these reporters are part of a media system that generally discounts serious critics of bipartisan, status-quo Washington, relies on maintaining access to government officials, and more often than not fails to adequately challenge those officials. The fact that those reporters might not live near many evangelical Christians might be true, but it’s hard to see how that has any connection to the work they do–or the kind of news we get.

Activism Director and and Co-producer of CounterSpinPeter Hart is the activism director at FAIR. He writes for FAIR's magazine Extra! and is also a co-host and producer of FAIR's syndicated radio show CounterSpin. He is the author of The Oh Really? Factor: Unspinning Fox News Channel's Bill O'Reilly (Seven Stories Press, 2003). Hart has been interviewed by a number of media outlets, including NBC Nightly News, Fox News Channel's O'Reilly Factor, the Los Angeles Times, Newsday and the Associated Press. He has also appeared on Showtime and in the movie Outfoxed. Follow Peter on Twitter at @peterfhart.

This blog does an excellent job of critiquing Mike Allen’s question and the responses. I should add that Mr. Allen’s question is the wrong question to ask. Besides using not well-defined terms like liberal and conservative, what’s important to discuss (for most the audience) is the institutional roles that corporate and elite journalists have at media institutions. That is, whose interests do these journalists serve, and what journalism do they produce? In those institutions, the views and associations of journalists is irrelevant; only serving the priorities of the institution owners and advertisers is what is internalized by these journalists. For example, if one imagines every factory worker at General Motors prefers to make Ferrari s, does that preference have any influence on what General Motors produces? The answer is no.

The media are not telling the truth about our policies and provocations in the Middle East, global warming, the obvious need for single-payer health insurance, still-unrestrained Wall Street corruption, bribe-takers in the Congress, the worst Supreme Court in history, NRA activities, real unemployment rates, and poverty in the U.S. Instead, we get vapid responses by noriously incompetent journalists to a poorly phrased, irrelevant question.

Labelling journalism left or right is a huge and disgusting distraction from what is actually important. What I mean is that it’s a wonderful way to get people to argue and fight over whether they prefer jimmies or nuts on their carcinogenic ice cream sundae. The discussion ought to focus on whether journalism is paying homage to or acting sycophantic toward an establishment master. That is all that matters, the rest is just noise, but noise on which (most) media seems to want all of us to focus.

I think that for these people “left” is entirely a matter of culture-war fodder, ranging from the serious (abortion) to the ridiculous (“war on Christmas”). These answers make sense in terms of prejudices they probably hold about the public outside their socio-economic-geographic zone.

The economic issues being pointed out in this excellent FAIR post simply aren’t part of their awareness.

At this point the “Liberal Left” for them is a bogey man, albeit one that actually exists, but for them it is like the old “Communist” that used to lurk in the shadows, ready to jump out and say boo, scaring the little conservatives.

They use the self-serving ‘leaning left’ to justify further lurching to the right; not unlike a blind drunk who has lost their way, but in no way is going to stop and ask directions. They simply assume that by constantly going right eventually they will return to the beginning and thus the “self fulfilling prophesy” that the Media is too left and must be taken right, but without the public knowing. “Nothing to see here, keep moving”.

It’s clear as a bell that even “liberal” MSNBC won’t do certain things, such as: Interviewing Noam Chomsky, the US foremost dissident and world renown intellectual; reporting on the German export machine, which dwarfs every country’s but China’s; the Israeli atomic arsenal, which is quite extensive, and includes neutron bombs.

MSNBC is owned by GE, Comcast, and NBC itself, hardly left wing entities. Also, look at some of the recent 60 Minute reports on
Benghazi and disability recipients; both had a clear right wing slant.

People REALLY need to stop watching these garbage “news” channels entirely. Get your news from a variety of international sources of varying sizes and slants. The American infotainment/propaganda “news” channels have zero credibility. You’re dumbed for having watched them.

They lie, spin and suck when they “work”, why would they reflect any part of central truth at a round-table – its nonsense to even pay them any attention other than to jail them while so many people worldwide suffer at the will of their myths.

It seems to me that none of the “journalists” even understand the difference between right and left. How can anyone graduate from a postgraduate jschool program and not know the difference between left and right political positions, let alone the phony left and right they are talking about (ala the Overton Window) that’s about 1 inch wide and has no depth at all. See what I mean by taking the fun little quiz at http://www.politicalcompass.org

What the hell does “lean left” or “lean right” mean? The only meaningful distinciton is “lean corporate”. The main issue is economic, not abortion, gay rights, birth control, or prayer in the schools. Does the media express the corporate view: the generalized failure of government, the need to reduce the deficit, the playing down of the climate crisis, the failings of public schools, the rightness of US militancy abroad, etc. Of course the media leans corporate. It always has.

It seems that it was a classical “question substitution*” case. They answered whether THEY, the journalists themselves, lean left, not whether the media leans left, which is a much more complex question.

*Daniel Kahneman, in “Thinking, Fast and Slow”, extensively discusses what is called the Substitution Principle: if a satisfactory answer to a hard question is not found quickly, [the brain] will find a related question that is easier and will answer it. (Kahneman, p. 97)

As the livable wage isn’t livable and as the media is very suspect in its truthiness ( see Iran and the bomb that never was) one has to wonder about the future of the “elite media.”

Perhaps this will be a necessary learning curve for many reporters.
When there is no one left with any money to buy the words of the 6 media giants, nor the products of those advertisers, maybe then, we will finally reach a level playing field, and we can finally get some real news. : )

Funniest joke coming out of the media: the myth of the left-leaning media!

I remember sitting in philosophy classes with those “journalism” students in college. By the second week if they hadn’t already dropped the elective they would be either silent as church mice, asked the dumbest questions, or gave the dumbest answers! They didn’t have a clue who they were. They were too busy chasing shallow pursuits!

Years ago, maybe in the late 1980’s or early 1990’s this was a hot topic of discussion. There was some study of newspaper reporters to find out their political leanings and it concluded that on balance more of them thought of themselves as liberal than conservatives. Of course, the media concluded from this (and expounded openly on their conclusion) that the press, and especially the New York Times, was very liberal so the news had a very liberal slant.

Of course the study did not investigate the political leanings of editors or executives at the same newspapers and anyone who has actually worked for a big corporation will probably agree that these people no doubt have more ability to slant the news than a cub reporter at the lowest rungs of the journalism profession.

Yes, but Peter, don’t you see they are who they are whatever that may mean and why we still don’t get the kind of news necessary to be informed. Each and every one of them are spineless jellyfish types afraid to lay claim to who and what they feel is important to report, in effect we get lukewarm fluff masquerading as informed news, and clearly they are so privileged and out of touch really that they basically are clueless, none are Edward R Murrows, or even Walter Cronkites
They make enormous sums to do what, not take a stand? By that I mean just saying what 2 positions are is silly, since it’s pretty clear one of the 2 positions makes more sense. I’ve said this before and it’s worth repeating:
As the corporate media thinks it’s objectivity they’re pushing as they’re telling both sides, with their ‘Dems said this and Reps said that’ as their tried and untrue tit for tat ninnyhammered nabobbed nonsense nixed by anyone with a brain and while two sides may exist, there is a better argument of the two and it’s hardly if ever in 4 decades now, a Republican’s position. And Hell yes, I’m a liberal, a Progressive. So suck on it.But it does not mean what I just said is biased because I’m a liberal..
And further:
Take most any issue, ANY issue, you need not know what the issues are, particularly to do with politics, you can rest though, assured that the Tbagging-Rethug-uglies-nutty-CONJOBserviceTURDives-unrealistic-religiousRightsycophancying-GOP putrid pundits as spokesmen, and party members will take the side of THE most absurdly ridiculous unreasonable&likely insane&lobotomised position available&possible to them&each&every member of this special strain of goobers will end up espousing the very same atavistic caveman nuttiness from their GOP-Goober filled-nonsensical-blathering-bubble of totally lying batshit belching vomitous vitriolic bullshit they can muster, while thinking ‘they’ are really onto something here.Ted Cruz, as the fine model of GOPness, has been doubly lobotomised, they removed both hemispheres of his brain, how is it he can still stand up?Well, if an entire GOP membership has gotten this far with the main requirment being the left hemisphere of their brains be lobotomised while pledging to love the religious Rights devoid of any values stance, and they somehow get elected repeatedly, so chances are swell that even their supporters/followers have met the basic requirements.

Raymond: You make it sound like the Dems are on the side of the truth and justice. Perhaps that might have been partially true 20 years ago. But when both parties agree to give the xmas gift of no unemployment to millions there is no longer any difference.

@ FreeSpirit, I can’t disagree with you actually, often I equate Ds with those in the party before they moved sp far rightward and became less than Progressives, and if Progressives are not the ones who are for truth and justice who just happen to caucus with Ds then we really are screwed as money replaces truth and justice for individuals and George Orwell’s “During times of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.”
I know my mini GOP rant may have overshadowed the inherent character of D Party who have pushed out too many of the Progressives in the party and hence deserve a mini rant of the same kind as the GOP one as the conservative Democrats(an oxymoron) typically soften legislation Progressives come up with to appease their GOP buddies ending with gutting the good parts of bills and defeating their main impetus for the most good for the most people.
The post was getting long so if you substitute Ds with Progressives, then it becomes way more accurate for who is for truth and justice, it ain’t all Ds, and even HR 347 passed overwheliming as well as the Senate version with the help of….PROGRESSIVES for heavens sake, and once they go the way of the rest of the Democrat/Republican Party (I purposely left off the ‘ic’ as the lobotomised GOP members can’t call them anything else, but yet they don’t say, the Republic Party do they?), the USA really is doomed, then corporations can start placing paid logo ads directly on the lawmakers for this ‘The United Corporations of America’ corporate state.
Thanks for the feedback.

I’ll offer two critical thinking basics: A “False Dichotomy”, which is on hideous display in the Politico roundtable and in American political discourse generally, is a fallacy. To limit discourse to “two sides” and then force people to choose one of them is to enforce broken reasoning. Our corporate media have ensconced these notions by constantly presenting another fallacious form: False Equivalency. “The Earth is flat” vs. “The Earth is a lumpy sphere” is not a question well served by giving each side equal time, but CNN wouldn’t dare be caught giving short shrift to the flat-Earth position! –Thanks to FAIR for calling attention to this pseudo-journalistic marvel: another reminder of how desperate we are for real reporting. All of the comments here are right on as well. –Now, to be truly critical and fair, I hope the next post I read from FAIR is not so riddled with grammatical errors; this piece by Mr. Hart is in serious need of editing! (Or maybe I’m just some right-wing hack out to attack anything that threatens to blow the cover of the corporate media!)

As for the grammatical mistakes: they say Beethoven made mistakes when he played the piano but he played like no one else (in a good way)! Personally, I do not concern myself with the form rather the content. Peter Hart, like all the writers at FAIR is a heart yearning for fairness and justice. That is all that matters to me. I wish people like Peter predominated the media the world over.

Thank you to FAIR and to all the compassionate people who frequent this ghetto! It makes me feel less intellectually lonely.

I had to mention the editing only because the current post is very hard to follow, especially in the first half or so. But I hope my DEEP respect for Mr. Hart and FAIR came through clearly–FAIR is one of the very few hard-working, ethical journalistic enterprises that gives us hope, steam, and dare I say ammunition!

[…] enough. Last year, a panel discussion with several high-profile journalists was notable (FAIR Blog, 12/19/13) because the reporters endorsed this criticism of their profession, agreeing that the media did not […]